THE Coffs Coast community commemorated National Road Safety Week (NRSW) with a solemn ceremony at the North Coast Regional Botanic Garden on Thursday 15 May.
Organised by the City of Coffs Harbour, the ceremony was held alongside a yellow-flowering Remembrance Garden, where guests could write the name of a loved one on a tribute ribbon.
Deputy Mayor George Cecato, a member of the City’s Local Traffic Committee, said National Road Safety Week was a time to reflect on lives lost and changed, and ongoing efforts to improve safety for all road users.
“Road trauma touches so many lives in Coffs Harbour,” he said.
“Unlike the often-slow creep of illness or a chronic medical condition, a road crash can happen in the blink of an eye and lead to life-changing heartache rippling across a community.”
Guest speaker at the event was road safety campaigner Peter Frazer OAM.
Other event speakers were Sergeant Jarrod Langan from the Coffs Harbour Highway Patrol and Professor Julie Brown who leads the injury program at the George Institute for Global Health.
Prof. Brown heads a team of researchers working on the Community Action for Safe Speeds Study (CASS) in local government areas across NSW, including in Coffs Harbour.
This research aims to find innovative ways to reduce speeding-related road trauma through increasing public demand for safer speeds.
By Andrea FERRARI
